Bogota as we saw it today

The kids loved the drive we took today to the orphanage. We had to travel an area that is very different than where we are staying. A place you wouldn’t go to on your own. For those of you in Cincinnati, it’s like Over The Rhine but worse. I tried to make some notes of the things the we noticed. So here goes.

First of all lets talk about the traffic and transportation. Very different than in the states. Not scary like some have described, but different I would agree with. You have to understand that more than a million cars are in Bogota so traffic is nuts. Because of the amount of cars and the pollution issues (you can smell the pollution), there are some regulations. Each car has a numbered type of license plate and only certain numbers can drive at certain times on certain days. So lots of people ride bikes, they are everywhere. Also because of the traffic a lot of folks ride on mopeds or mini motorcycles. They all wear vests with their “license number” on their back. Apparently the big perk to driving a moped is that you can weave in and out of the cars, taxis and busses and drive between lanes of traffic. At stop lights you don’t have to stop behind the car in front of you, oh no, you simply weave between the lanes so you can get all the way up at the front of the line and be the first one to go when the light turns green. Which brings me to another point. The stop lights here go from red to yellow to green. If you are at a red light you stop, when it turns yellow you rev your engine and prepare to take off. So when it turns green you gun it.


Also at every stop light there were vendors in the street handing various items into the your window. Then they would come back by and either collect the item or money if you wish to buy it. These vendors are brave. They walk between lanes of traffic, but remember the mopeds are weaving in and out too so they can get to the front of the line. These folks are lucky to be alive if you ask me. It’s all kind of funny really.


Little yellow taxis are everywhere as well as huge extended busses. Lots of the busses are the length of two busses together and they are always packed like sardines.

We’ve seen several horses pulling small buggies behind them too. We saw a horse today roaming the streets of the city, Emilee couldn’t believe it. Also dogs roam everywhere and poop all over the sidewalk, well at least in the area were the orphanage was. I don’t think that happens where we are staying.



Graffiti is on nearly every building. Nate said “obviously the cops don’t arrest people for using spray paint around here.” The art is amazing, but holy cow, graffiti is everywhere. Here is a small sample of the graffiti.


We also passed the huge futbol stadium. There is a game today, so we saw all the folks all decked out for the game and security was everywhere. There were also security guards at every bus station.

Colombian people are beautiful and very warm and friendly and the flowers here are brilliant colors. People dote over the kids and can’t get over their red hair. They say “muy bonita” and always touch their hair. The kids have learned that rojo means red, they’ve heard it 50 times by now, but they aren’t complaining they are liking the attention.

Oh and the sun screen is going to come in handy. The weather is perfect but I can already tell my face is going to fry if I’m not careful. I will have to keep an eye on my fair skinned family. Good thing I brought a lot of sun screen.

We've finally made contact with Eric's mom and Ronnie. So we feel better now that everyone who wanted to use the webcams have been able to see us see we are safe and sound.